Climate Change Thread

[gourimoko]

Is anyone in here a majority owner in an oil company, an oil lobbyist, part of a Super PAC or work for FOX news?

Ummm...

In all fairness, yes, I am... but, it's for a good cause!

 

[KI4MVP]

To us, lefty arguments sound a lot like "well, so what if energy costs more, we'll be humping the fucking trees anyway, so who cares about a little extra money" And what we think is "do these naïve twits have any clue what those higher costs will mean in terms of jobs and the economy, and real world, concrete suffering?

I never said that. I said invest the money in R&D to accelerate the time frame for it to be more cost effective to use renewable energy over fossil fuels. We both agree that it's inevitable that it will eventually be more cost effective, it's a win for everyone if that timeframe is moved up.

The climate change issue makes it important that we as a society do everything we can to accelerate that process by developing new technologies, infrastructure, and changing the way we are used to doing things.

 

[Otsego Mar]

Jesus H Christ

 

[The Human Q-Tip]

I never said that.

I never said you did. I was speaking hyperbolically to illustrate what each side sometimes thinks of the other.

But obviously, there is a pretty wide spectrum of measures that can be taken regarding global warming. Some extra money government money spent on R&D is one of the milder steps proposed, so both my disagreement with that and the expected benefits would be more mild.

To put it differently, I don't think your idea is unreasonable or radical at all. I just disagree with it, but it's certainly plausible.

I said invest the money in R&D to accelerate the time frame for it to be more cost effective to use renewable energy over fossil fuels. We both agree that it's inevitable that it will eventually be more cost effective, it's a win for everyone if that timeframe is moved up.

As I said, I don't think that's the end of the world, but I still disagree with it because I think that kind of politicized government-funded research grants tend to be a huge, inefficient boondoggle, and research funded by such grants often becomes directed more towards ensuring that grant money keeps coming rather than spending the money efficiently. We get too much weird shit like the coren-based ethanol issues, etc..

To put it differently, you don't often see many recipients of government grants turn around and say "you know, we've figured out that this isn't a very promising avenue, so rather than wasting more of the taxpayers' money, we're returning everything we haven't spent."

In any case, I don't think that research is the real bottleneck in converting. Private industry already has a lot of incentives to pursue this research. The real bottlenecks are some inherent limitations, the cost of conversion and the relative cheapness/portability of oil.

I do think we should really try to streamline/improve the whole nuclear regulatory environment, though. It's a technology that we have that has essentially been killed by environmental concerns here in the U.S. and politics here in the U.S.. And we can fix that without tossing around a lot of taxpayer money, or getting involved with the crony capitalism of government grants.

 

[The Oi]

Is it even possible to reaffirm something you never had?

Just wondering....

According to Zeno's paradox, I'm always halfway back to the credibility I started out with here about 10 years ago.

Excellent dig. However, the credibility I command relates to being a-political, not smart.

I wish you'd unblock @gourimoko.

 

[Bill Walton.]

You guys are a bunch of nerds..

Dick Goddard called he wants his thread back!


Oh snap!

 

[The Human Q-Tip]

According to Zeno's paradox, I'm always halfway back to the credibility I started out with here about 10 years ago.

Excellent dig.

I wish you'd unblock @gourimoko.

Why, so you could witness a reprise of the Nastynate/gouri slapfight? It was admittedly pretty entertaining even though I only saw half of it.

As entertaining as that possibility might seem right now, neither myself nor anyone else on this board, likely including gouri, enjoys things like the argument over Star Trek. We have different views as to what constitutes fact v. opinion, and how discussions should proceed.

And, our differing views on internet experts alone make it a mix that is flawed right from the start.

I'll just leave it at that. But I do sometimes read his stuff on the Cavs side of things, and occasionally something in entertainment.

 

[gourimoko]

No @The Oi things are fine just the way they are...

As entertaining as that possibility might seem right now, neither myself nor anyone else on this board, likely including gouri, enjoys things like the argument over Star Trek. We have different views as to what constitutes fact v. opinion, and how discussions should proceed.

You're right we do.

To me a fact is something that is a known observable, or something that can be proven logically; I'm not sure why, but it seems you want to avoid dealing with fact-based reasoning.

You claim to be up for debate, but when someone who knows how to debate engages you, you backpedal, obfuscate, or simply fall back on "this is what I believe, and you're not an expert so, fuck it."

The problem Q-Tip is your inability to ever concede a point; any point, however small. It makes for circular arguments that span pages and pages without ever actually getting anywhere. You magnify the scope of an argument to drown it in minutia, or make the argument impossible by attacking the person presenting it.

And, our differing views on internet experts alone make it a mix that is flawed right from the start.

That's the thing though, we don't have differing views. I'm with you, I don't take people's opinions at face value simply because they claim to know what they're talking about.

But this is just another "debate" tactic really. This is the last resort. You present this logic as if I claim to be some expert and that my arguments are somehow resting on that expertise. But I have never once made such a claim, in any thread, about anything.

The reason you do this is obvious.. It's so that you're left with a final way to get out of an argument..

"Well, you're no expert, so what do you know? We just disagree."

This ends conversations instantly, because for one, no one is claiming to be an expert (although you have on more than one occasion); and secondly, the argument's premises should build it's conclusion.

No argument can have as it's premise: "I am an expert, thus, this argument somehow is automatically sound."

I always rely on propositional logic and propositional calculus to formulate an argument and that would literally defeat the purpose of my post instantly. But since you don't really understand what this means, and when you get cornered in a debate, well, you'll always have that trusty out: "you're no expert!" (only experts can engage in critical thinking and analysis?)

I'll just leave it at that. But I do sometimes read his stuff on the Cavs side of things, and occasionally something in entertainment.

Indeed.

It's much easier to ignore an argument than it is to rebut it.

But to be perfectly honest, I'm fine with the way things are. I was getting tired of the endless back and forth in numerous threads, and when you finally said "I don't debate, I just present my views" well, that pretty much ended the conversation then and there.

 

[Zog]

What percentage of fossil fuel pollution is from vehicles vs fossil fuels used to create electricity?

Circa 2009 when I took a class on renewable energies, solar panels were at that time progressing at Mohr's Law and if they continued to progress at that rate, it was estimated that three giant solar farms in India's deserts could provide enough power for the entire world by 2020.

How much would pollution decrease if vehicles were the only thing putting out pollution?

 

[gourimoko]

What percentage of fossil fuel pollution is from vehicles vs fossil fuels used to create electricity?

27% of emissions are from cars/trucks and other modes of transportation.
31% of emissions are from power generation.

Circa 2009 when I took a class on renewable energies, solar panels were at that time progressing at Mohr's Law and if they continued to progress at that rate, it was estimated that three giant solar farms in India's deserts could provide enough power for the entire world by 2020.

How much would pollution decrease if vehicles were the only thing putting out pollution?

If you moved to clean energy generation you'd cut roughly a third of emissions.
If you moved to electric vehicles that used clean power, you'd cut almost another third.

With such a transition, as well as clean air regulations, you could potentially get emissions down to only 20% of their present day levels. This would help mitigate the problem of man-made climate change tremendously.

 

[Sebastian]

Algae, people. Algae.

 

[Sebastian]

So we'll literally never run out of a substance created by fossils regardless of the speed at which human beings extract it? It regenerates that fast?

When and why did this become a conservatives vs liberals thing? It just seems like it could have arbitrarily gone either way dependent on what oil company heads, Super PACs, lobbyists and talking heads wanted to manipulate their minions to believe.

Well, traditional Democratic constituents are less likely to give Big Oil a pass whereas the GOP base doesn't have much interest in environmental issues (outside, say Alaska). Moreover, GOP fans seemingly could care less if their representatives are openly bought and paid for by the highest corporate bidders judging by the support people like Scott Walker continue to receive.

Behold, the stupidity:

http://www.vox.com/2015/10/26/9616370/science-committee-worse-benghazi-committee

The House Science Committee is Worse than the Benghazi Committee

"...The thing is: The Benghazi committee is not even the worst committee in the House. I'd argue that the House science committee, under the chairmanship of Lamar Smith (R-TX), deserves that superlative for its open-ended, Orwellian attempts to intimidate some of the nation's leading scientists and scientific institutions.

The science committee's modus operandi is similar to the Benghazi committee's — sweeping, catchall investigations, with no specific allegations of wrongdoing or clear rationale, searching through private documents for out-of-context bits and pieces to leak to the press, hoping to gain short-term political advantage — but it stands to do more lasting long-term damage.

In both cases, the investigations have continued long after all questions have been answered. (There were half a dozen probes into Benghazi before this one.) In both cases, the chair has drifted from inquiry to inquisition. But with Benghazi, the only threat is to the reputation of Hillary Clinton, who has the resources to defend herself. With the science committee, it is working scientists being intimidated, who often do not have the resources to defend themselves, and the threat is to the integrity of the scientific process in the US. It won't take much for scientists to get the message that research into politically contested topics is more hassle than it's worth."

 

[gourimoko]

Behold, the stupidity:

http://www.vox.com/2015/10/26/9616370/science-committee-worse-benghazi-committee

 

[The Human Q-Tip]

With the science committee, it is working scientists being intimidated, who often do not have the resources to defend themselves, and the threat is to the integrity of the scientific process in the US. It won't take much for scientists to get the message that research into politically contested topics is more hassle than it's worth."

Oh, I think they've already gotten that message....

Senator: Use RICO Laws to Prosecute Global Warming Skeptics

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...a2c448-0574-11e5-8bda-c7b4e9a8f7ac_story.html

In any case, it shouldn't surprise anyone that politics infects government-funded science. Government is politics. That's one reason I generally oppose it. Especially since Congressional oversight is something that is supposed to happen.

Smith may well be an idiot and completely wrong on this (hard to tell because of the lack of details), but it seems a little odd to pretend that Congress seeking information from an executive agency is beyond the pale. If Congress starts sticking its nose into privately funded research, I'd agree that's messed up. But at least in terms of the basic functioning of government, this doesn't seem odd to me.

I suspect that if it was a GOP Administration that was employing a climate change denier, and a Democratic Congress issung the subpoenas, the principled outrage wouldn't be quite as strong.

 

[Zog]

27% of emissions are from cars/trucks and other modes of transportation.
31% of emissions are from power generation.



If you moved to clean energy generation you'd cut roughly a third of emissions.
If you moved to electric vehicles that used clean power, you'd cut almost another third.

With such a transition, as well as clean air regulations, you could potentially get emissions down to only 20% of their present day levels. This would help mitigate the problem of man-made climate change tremendously.

So you'd need to have enough clean energy sources to be able to make the electricity for electric cars with clean energy.

We do need to come up with a plan on how to replace jobs of workers that currently work in the oil and gas industry. Those are generally high paying jobs and Texas' economy in particular would be devastated if the oil industry ceased to exist.